Gratuitous daffodil shot

Another sign of Spring in some places. This was taken in the wilds of Connecticut last year.

Chill

It has gotten a bit cold here. Smells like fall. One night we go from the fan sucking cool, sweet mountain air into our room, to the next night having the whole apartment closed down--us draped in sweaters, smothered nightly in a heavy comforter, me cursing my lack of a good pair of boots for farm work (thus relying on the old trusty sandals in the 40-degree dewy morning). But don't get me wrong, it feels good.

Basil and pepper plants are pissed. Basil hates the cold; sweet peppers also hate the deluge we've been getting of late. Even some of the lettuce, the cool-moisture lover that it is, is rotting in the field. But arugula is happy. Napas and bok choi are trying hard. Kale would probably be happy if not for the plague of harlequin bugs. But we can take heart that the flea beetles have seemingly left us for the year. And we haven't gotten flooded like some of our unfortunate WNC neighbors.

We've got a bit over a month left at this farm, where we'll keep tending our fall/winter crops for market and, most importantly, CSA members. It's a bit of an unwinding time, at least in my mind, despite all that's left to do.

In other news, the blueberries are still plentiful up on Max Patch, as of last weekend. We were picking amongst the roaring wind and the cries of the haint (or a flying kite; or a creaking tree--I'm not sure).

The near future brings visitors from afar and, maybe, if things fall right, a trip into the backcountry (our last camping excursion near Mt. Mitchell left us soaked, a couple additional inches of rain away from being devoured by a rising river, and within several hundred feet of being crushed by a toppled tree--which is what I call an adventure).

In the meantime I'll be happy to watch the trees slowly transform as the cold sets in and daylight contracts. Already we see the 4,000+ foot peaks that poke into the sky around our cove hueing toward orangish-yellow. The vegetation on the creek banks is thinning to the point where we can see the road again for the first time since May. The ragweed has pretty much done its thing (ahhhh... relief). Sumacs everywhere are blushing mightily.  They're calling for a less than stellar fall color show this year because of all the rain we've had. But I wouldn't heed what "they" say. Because, well, the spring leafing was beyond words, in it's spectacularly subtle green gradient, and hardly anyone even touches on how beautiful that is--ever.

How's fall on everyone else's land? Fruits and veggies still going by you?

Blueberries laugh at the tractor

We spent part of the last two weekends picking wild blueberries on the Blue Ridge Parkway (Graveyard Fields--it ain't no secret). There were so many bushes to visit, and lots of ripe berries--much more than I expected. All told, we picked several pounds, stopping only because of my fatigue. They've gone good on cereal and pancakes. We froze a bunch of 'em for future sustenance.

It's enrapturing, this wild bounty. Earlier this year it was morels. We've had elderberries, strawberries (not really comparable to the domesticated crop, but edible nonetheless), and blackberries as well. All without cultivation of any sort.

Yeah, nature is pretty good at growing things. I try to remember this when I think about having our own farm in the near future. You can't really go wrong trying to emulate nature. Of course, as humans, we are a part of nature as well, and we've got some nice tools to enhance things.

We're learning lots these days, but, for me, the biggest lesson is in seeing anew how things move of their own accord. It may be good or bad for people, but when all is said and done, life continues in one way or another. Which is something to notice and appreciate.

The days are getting noticeably shorter as summer wanes. Ragweed and lamb's quarters are trying to make babies (sneezes are in full swing). Only the occasional optimistic mateless lightning bug still sparks just after dusk. Non-conformist locust and cicadas groan loudly in the heat of the afternoon. The swallows that successfully avoided the acrobatic black snake have moved out. The Perseids recently made their spectacular fireworks, even under the gaze of a persistent moon.

Though we generally anticipate what's coming up for us, it's hard to say what shape it will take. Transitions are tremendous. Not knowing is half the excitement.

I'm content with not knowing; I try to get a feel for the movement.

What happened inbetween rains?

Bushhogged some of our cover crop down. The rye was tall and the vetch was clingy. Mmmm.. taste the organic matter and soil nutrients.

Harvested some rainbow chard, among many other things.

 

Sold our goods at the market.

 

Watched frogs and toads do it in the puddles. A lot.

 From tadpoles to little hopping toadpoles with tails. 

 

The ghost of Max Patch.

 

We were eventually blessed with 10 minutes of spectacular views when the fog temporarily blew out.

 

Finally, a shot from the Blue Ridge Parkway, somewheres between Asheville and Waynesville. The laurels are in full bloom.

scavenging and growing

The last couple days have been dry, warm, and sunny. Which means that our backlog of way-too-big greenhouse plants could get transplanted into the fields. Chard, choi, brocolli, lettuce, potatoes (seeded), kohlrabi, and cabbage all escaped their plastic prisons. It was a good feeling to get 'em all out. Here's a shot of the lettuces and some of the brassicas right before they got trucked out to the field.

How about the greenhouse cukes? Click to see the detail. Those tentacles are beautiful and strong. And notice the fruit in the first pic. Hopefully we defeated the soil disease problem.

The arugula and other greens we direct-seeded into the greenhouse our first day here? They're coming along, and some should be ready for next week's tailgate market.

Here's potatoes being planted. The implement is called a dragsetter. Two folks sit on the thing and drop potato pieces while one person pulls it with the tractor. A shoe digs a trench, and those wheels you see pack in dirt over the dropped potato. I was the driver. It was my first time doing potatoes like this. It was fast and easy. This dirt is plowed and disked, but there was really no need to till it up.

Then we found these yesterday admidst a stand of poplars on the ridge (thanks Molly!).

That's four yellows and three greys. They were all solitary; that fact combined with the mounds of deer shit and disturbed leaves make us think the deer are devouring all the morels. But it's just a theory. Oh, and we found that turtle shell that the morels are laying against. Not a bounty of morels, but it was so satisfying to finally find them ourselves and cook 'em up in some butter and eat 'em. They were yummy.

Also came across this spike morel that was too dried out to harvest or eat. Ugly mutha, right?

Beautiful tulip we saw during our foragings.

First market of the season is tomorrow, so we'll probably be heading down to Asheville to check it out. Then we get to tour a farm down in Saluda Saturday evening as part of our apprenticeship learning experience. And then we get a roommate on Sunday (the third apprentice). So, it's gonna be a busy weekend.

Most of the photos in this post were taken by Meagan. All the credit for the pretty pics should go to her. Plus she contributes about half of all the other photos on the blog.

April snows bring May...uh...?

Photos, as promised (kind of).

The snow begins. You may have to click on the pic to see the flakes.

Almost post-accumulation. From right to left: See how the cover crop (a mix of rye, vetch, clover, and field peas) doesn't get blanketed. You can also see the row cover over the strawberries. Finally, a field road, covered in snow. Also, we still think that's Bluff in the background (poor AT through-hikers must've had a couple miserable nights, because they got something like six inches up there, so I'm told).

Sunset before the storms.

This is the greenhouse we direct seeded on our first day here, photo taken about a week and a half ago.

Same greenhouse--a few days ago. Somewhere in the vicinity of when this photo was taken, we weeded (most of it)!

Preparing a different greenhouse for tomatoes, which, if everything goes right, we'll start harvesting in June! All the straw-colored stuff is dead rye and mustards, which we chopped up with a giant weedwacker. This here is a no-till operation. We just used shovels to loosen up the soil between the giant t-posts, where we'll transplant our ready-to-go tomato plants. The dead rye will be mulch, which will hopefully inhibit the growth of weeds. Not pictured are the cattle panels we installed. The tomatoes will have lots of opportunity to grow upwards.

Same greenhouse. We needed to replace the aged and holey plastic, and do some repairs on the baseboards (the difference in the clarity of the plastic is astounding). Oh, and scaffolds and front-end loaders are fun (if you're crazy). Don't try this at home.

Finally, today's glimpse from the top of Max Patch. Max Patch sits at about 4,600 feet on the TN/NC border, and the AT passes over it. 360 degree views let you see something like four states on a clear day. It is treeless thanks to years of cattle grazing. Now someone maintains its prairie-like setting. If you can handle the twisty, largely unpaved drive up to the trailhead, it's only a short, mildly strenuous walk to the summit. It was a hazy day today, but what I saw still made me thankful for being alive. (Also see my new profile pic for another shot from the top of Max Patch.)

Rain and white lightning

It's been rainy here, but warm (to me at least). We've been doin lots of seeding and transplanting. But it ain't all business.

So, you know the greenhouse where we're propagating; well, half of it was planted in a cover crop of mustard greens, like so:

We tilled these mustards in as a green manure to add organic matter and help combat what we believe to be some sort of pathogen in this particular soil. After a few days of watering and waiting for the greens to break down, we transplanted these cukes:

So far, so good (we only lost one of the transplants). As you can see, the cukes are gonna be growing up those cattle panels we installed. And let me tell you, it took some major pounding, grunts, and sweat to get those t-posts in.

Our first seedlings have germinated well. Not sure if this is a picture of the kohlrabi or one of the other brassicas. This is a shot taken three days after seeding:

And here's a pic of one of the other greenhouses, where we planted those greens I talked about in a previous post. I think that's arugula poking out (you might also see that we have lots of weeding to do already). Photo was taken on 3/27, 10 days after seeding.

Here are lots of flats of potted up flowers, herbs, and veggies sitting on pallets next to the beds of cukes. We're running out of table space.

And then some extra-curriculars. We caught these trout:

In these ponds:

Then we cleaned 'em and ate 'em immediately. Best fish I've ever had.

And then there was happy hour. All I'll say is that it was so smooth and would be one hell of a drink on a cold night.

We're rural

It takes a long time to get anywhere from where we live. Twenty minutes gets you to the closest population center (about 900 people). Then it's another 20 minutes or so to find a regular grocery store. Another 20 minutes gets you to Asheville.

We went to Asheville for the first time yesterday to pick up some odds and ends. Spent a little time downtown and ate lunch at the Early Girl Eatery. For a small- to medium-sized city, Asheville sure has lots going on. The food we ate was delicious (and mostly locally sourced and/or naturally raised), the streets seemed full of energy (not in the New Age sense--just the energy of activity and purpose), and the scenery was about as good as it gets inside a city (Asheville is surrounded by the Blue Ridge Mountains). People were playing chess on the sidewalks and musicians were strumming on the corner with their cases open for donation. I wouldn't want to live in the city proper, but it seems like a great place to visit.

Other than that trip, we've spent almost all our time on the farm. It was a great first week, aside from the death of the dog who guarded the goats. We seeded lots of flats and a whole greenhouse. We started direct seeding in the field, but the rain stopped us. Now I look forward to seeing what we've planted germinate.

We also spent some time hiking the 130 acres that we live on. It was a nice vigorous hike up the ridge overlooking our cove. The land around us has lots of remnants of previous lives, including a cabin originally built in the late 1700s and an old springhouse (both of which are on the neighbors property, but you can glimpse them from our trails). The views of the surrounding mountains are breathtaking at this time of year because of the relatively bare tree canopy. But even when the leaves spring, beauty will still remain. I can't wait to see the rhododendrons pop.

Next week brings the building of a greenhouse, more seeding, maybe some repair work, and who knows what else. One of the neighbors brought us down a bag of frozen ramps and morels from last year's foraging, which we plan on eating this week for lunch. I really can't wait to try 'em. Ramp and morel season is close upon us here, and I hope to go out and gather my own.

So, it's never dull.

Down the Canyon

With spring just around the corner and our imminent move to one of the most beautiful areas in the country just a few weeks away, I thought I'd post about our short adventure into another beautiful area of the country that occurred this past May: the Grand Canyon. Plus, this blog needs some pictures, and I got lots of decent shots of the Canyon while hiking from rim to river.

It was an experience. Six of us rented a van in Vegas and drove to the South Rim, knowing full well our backcountry permit had been denied in February because the corridor trails (South Kaibab and Bright Angel--the most maintained trails in the whole park) into the canyon are so popular. But we figured we'd get on the in-person waiting list and hope for the best. If we weren't successful, we'd just explore the upper regions of the canyon with several day hikes.

We made it to the South Rim, gear and people smooshed into the van (I told the annoyingly skeptical rental counter guy we could do it--that naysayer), and it was cold at night. Snow was still on the ground. Some of us were freezing in our tents. I was pretty warm though.

The next morning, we got on the waiting list, and we received the last available permit to do the hike. Some of us were a bit freaked out; some of us were pumped. We'd be going almost a vertical mile down and then up; in actual walking distance, it would be about seven miles down and around nine miles up. Not all in one day. Hike down, camp near Colorado River. Wake up next day, and hike out.

Next morning, we had to catch a 5:30 a.m. shuttle to get to the South Kaibab trailhead. Backpacks were loaded with clothes, quick-energy, high-protein foods, and various camping supplies. I had almost two liters of water clipped on to my pack. It was a chilly morning on the rim. But that would change.

The South Kaibab has some spectacular views. There ain't much in the way of trees or shrubs to impede your vision, which, as we would find out, makes for a warm sun beating down on you later in the day. But it was amazing to see the river get closer as we trekked onward.

We had several encounters with the NPS resupply mules and their rented bretheren that carry the non-hikers down to the bottom and back up. Give the mules room! Stay close to the inside of the trail!

The downward hike is more vigorous than one might think. It takes a toll on the legs always going down, down, down. And down (the South Kaibab is pretty consistent across the length of the trail when it comes to elevation change). And we shed layers as we went.

After the mainly desert/steppe environment of the South Kaibab, the bottom is like an oasis. The dammed-up Colorado is wide, tranquil, and beautiful. Bright Angel Creek, which roars down from the North side of the Canyon into the Colorado, makes you want to jump right in and cool off. Our rugged campsite was about 10 feet from the creek, and we enjoyed the sound of the rushing waters and the beautiful riparian flora.

Phantom Ranch is up the North Kaibab trail a piece, and after setting up camp, we headed that way. They have a small general store there (best lemonade and Snickers I've ever had), a kitchen (you must reserve a meal--and it's pricey), and park ranger workshops, as well as some cabins/rooms for those who don't like to camp. People who work in this remote village, live there. The rangers who work there live there for something like seven days at a time, then they get something like six days off, where they must hike up the canyon in some form or another, whether it's the backcountry or the rim. This consistent ascent and descent keeps them fit in case they have to run up the trails to help an injured hiker. You should see their calves.

So we took in a couple great ranger talks and then fell asleep early. We woke up early and hiked up the Bright Angel Trail. The Bright Angel is much different than the South Kaibab. There were several streams flowing across this trail in May, which is a welcome sight because you go through so much water during the heat of the day. I still was only carrying my nearly two liters of water, but because of all the flowing water (and my water filter), I wasn't really concerned about not having enough. Anyway, the Bright Angel is a much more lush experience than the Kaibab, but the tradeoff was that there were less grand views (but still lots of good ones).

So, the trail seemed easy at first (despite it being a much hotter day). We blew through the first half of it in no time, which made us a bit cocky about the ascent. But by the time we hit the Three Mile Rest area (that's three miles from the rim) we experienced a shift in the terrain. Those last three miles, and especially the last 1.5 miles, are a near constant climb. Frequent rest and food breaks were the norm.

But we made it back to the rim after several hours (I can't remember the specific time now). (And, just so we're clear, there were lots of people doing this hike. People of all ages and sizes. It just takes a little mental toughness and some sound preparedness.) We ate a large, warm, delicious meal at the surprisingly good Grand Canyon cafeteria, and then we took off for out-of-the-way places in Arizona.

The night ended in a cheap, rundown, dirty (did I say cheap?) hotel in Kingman, Arizona, where we treated ourselves to a sink full of beer on ice, Taco Bell, and The Flight of the Conchords.

One to remember.




(Note: Nothing I could do about the inconsistent formatting in this post. Blogger wasn't letting me put pictures where I wanted, so I did the best I could.)